Three Years on the Plains Observations of Indians, 1867-1870

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Title: Three Years on the Plains

Observations of Indians, 1867-1870

Author: Edmund B. Tuttle

Release Date: January 28, 2007 [EBook #20463]

Language: English

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THREE YEARS ON THE PLAINS

The Death of Johnson in Colorado.

Frontispiece.

THREE YEARS ON THE PLAINS

OBSERVATIONS OF INDIANS,

1867-1870

EDMUND B. TUTTLE

"Like an old pine-tree, I am dead at the top."

—Speech of an old chief

Dedication

TO

GEN. W. T. SHERMAN,

WHOSE SPLENDID TRIUMPHS IN TIMES OF WAR SHED LUSTRE UPON

THE NATION'S HISTORY,

AND

WHOSE WISE COUNSELS IN TIMES OF PEACE WILL

INCREASE THE NATION'S STRENGTH AND

PRESERVE ITS HONOR, THIS

LITTLE BOOK IS, BY

PERMISSION,

Respectfully Dedicated.

LETTER FROM GENERAL SHERMAN

Headquarters, Army of the United States, Washington, D. C.,

June 13th, 1870.

Rev. E. B. Tuttle, Fort D. A. Russell, W. T.

Dear Sir,—I have your letter of June 8th, and do not, of course, object to your dedicating your volume on Indians to me. But please don't take your facts from the newspapers, that make me out as favoring extermination.

I go as far as the farthest in favor of lavishing the kindness of our people and the bounty of the general government on those Indians who settle down to reservations and make the least effort to acquire new habits; but to those who will not settle down, who cling to their traditions and habits of hunting, of prowling along our long, thinly-settled frontiers, killing, scalping, mutilating, robbing, etc., the sooner they are made to feel the inevitable result the better for them and for us.

To those I would give what they ask, war, till they are satisfied.

Yours truly,

W. T. Sherman, General.

CONTENTS

List of Illustrationsxi

Introduction11

Where did the Indians come from?13

Despoiling the Grave of an old Onondaga Chief16

The Fidelity of an Indian Chief22

Big Thunder—a Winnebago Chief26

Indian Tradition—the Deluge27

Tribes on the Plains32

The Author a Medicine-man47

The Sioux Sun Dance—Scene on the Plains of Young Warriors exhibiting

      Fortitude and Bravery in Torturing Pains—a Horrible Scene48

Julesburg52

A Brave Boy and some Indians55

An Indian Meal56

Shall the Indians be exterminated?59

Indians don't believe half they hear65

Army Officers66

What shall be done?68

A Good Joke by Little Raven71

How the Indian is cheated72

Burial of a Chief's Daughter72

An Indian Raid on Sidney Station, Union Pacific Railroad75

Why do Indians scalp their Enemies?77

Indian Boy's Education79

Making Presents81

Indians making Signals81

Merciful Indians82

A Scene at North Platte82

Across the Plains87

Why does not the Indian meddle with the Telegraph?89

Plum Creek Massacre90

Pawnee Indians—Yellow Sun and Blue Hawk91

A Trip to Fort Laramie92

Moss Agates95

A Young Brave97

The Head Chief—Red Cloud100

Red Cloud's Journey106

Phil. Kearney Massacre107

Perilous Adventure—Pursuit of a Horse-Thief121

Hanging Horse-Thieves128

An Indian Fight at Sweetwater Mines131

Indian Attack on the Stage-Coach going to Denver—Rev. Mr. Fuller's

      Account of Two Attempts upon his Life135

Chaplain White says there's a time to Pray and a time to Fight143

Legend of Crazy Woman's Fork145

Phil. Kearney Massacre149

Mauvaises Terres, or Bad Lands, Dakota150

Natural History—Animals on the Plains153

A Night Scene158

The Mission-House160

Indian Language, Counting, etc.160

Indians attack Lieutenant W. Dougherty—Fight between

      Forts Fetterman and Reno161

Speech of White Shield, Head Chief of the Arickarees162

Indian Trading164

Red Cloud, Spotted Tail, and their Friends in Washington167

Conclusion201

Lord's Prayer in Sioux Language205

Apostles' Creed206

Distances206

ILLUSTRATIONS

The Death of Johnson in Coloradofrontispiece

FOLLOWING PAGE 102

Issac H. Tuttle

Indian Boys

Indian Burial

Bishop Clarkson

Group of Converted Indians

Spotted Tail and his Son

MAP

Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraskaxii-xiii

Detail from an 1877 map showing principal areas of Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska

mentioned by Tuttle. Ft. D. A. Russell was located near Cheyenne, Wyoming.

Original by S. Augustus Mitchell (1792-1868), 1" = 55 mi.

Courtesy Jerome A. Greene.

INTRODUCTION

The interest which boys are taking in all that relates to our Indian tribes, and the greediness they manifest in devouring the sensational stories published so cheaply, filling their imaginations with stories of wild Indian life on the plains and borders, without regard to their truthfulness, cannot but be harmful; and therefore the writer, after three years' experience on the plains, feels desirous of giving youthful minds a right direction, in a true history of the red men of our forests. Thus can they teach their children, in time to come, what kind of races have peopled this continent; especially before civilization had marked them for destruction, and their hunting-grounds for our possession.

The rights and wrongs of the Indians should be told fairly, in order that justice may be done to such as have befriended the white men who have met the Indians in pioneer life, and been befriended often by the savage, since the Mayflower landed her pilgrims on these shores some two hundred and fifty years ago.

The writer proposes now only a history of Indians since he began to know the Six Nations in Western New York, about forty years ago. Since then, these have dwindled down to a handful, and do not now exist in their separate tribal relations, but mixed in with others, far away from the beautiful lakes they once inhabited.

WHERE DID THE INDIANS COME FROM?

The origin of the native American Indian has puzzled the wisest heads.

The most plausible theory seems to be that they are one of the lost tribes of Israel; that they crossed a narrow frith from the confines of Asia, and that their traditions, it is said, go far to prove it.

For instance, the Sioux tell us that they were, many moons ago, set upon by a race larger in number than they, and were driven from the north in great fear, till they came to the banks of the North Platte, and finding the river swollen up to its banks, they were stopped there, with all their women, children, and horses. The enemy was pursuing, and their hearts grew white with fear. They made an offering to the Great Spirit, and he blew a wind into the water, so as to open a path on the bed of the river, and they all went over in safety, and the waters, closing up, left their enemies on the other side. This, probably, is derived from a tradition of their forefathers, coming down to them from the passing of the children of Israel through the Red Sea.

Elias Boudinot, many years ago, and a minister in Vermont also, published books to show that the American Indians were a portion of the lost tribes, from resemblances between their religious customs and those of the Israelites. Later still, a converted Jew named Simon, undertook to identify the ancient South American races, Mexicans, Peruvians, etc., as descendants of ancient Israel, from similarity of language and of civil and religious customs. These authors have taken as their starting-point the resolution which, Esdras informs us (in the Apocrypha), the ten tribes took after being first placed in the cities of the Medes, viz., that they would leave the multitude of the heathen and go into a land wherein never mankind dwelt, that they might there keep their laws, which God gave them; and they suppose that, in pursuance of this resolution, the tribes continued in a northeasterly direction until they came to Behring Straits, which they crossed, and set foot on this continent, spreading over it from north to south, until, at the discovery of it by Columbus, they had peopled every part. It must be admitted that this theory is very plausible, and that if our Indians are not the descendants of the lost tribes of Israel, they show by their traditions and customs a knowledge of the ancient religion, such as calling the Great Spirit Yo-he-wah, the Jehovah of the Scriptures, and in many festivals corresponding to the Mosaic law.[1] The country to which the ten tribes, in a journey of a year and a half, would arrive, from the river Euphrates, east, would be somewhere adjoining Tartary, and intercourse between the two races would easily lead to the adoption of the religious ideas and customs of the one by the other.

The gypsy tribes came from Tartary, and in my intercourse with these wandering people, I found they had a custom somewhat like our Indians' practice, in removing from place to place. For instance, the gypsies, when they leave a part of their company to follow them, fix leaves in such wise as to direct their friends to follow in their course. This is called "patteran" in Romany or gypsy language. And the Indian cuts a notch in a tree as he passes through a forest, or places stones in the plains in such a way as to show in what direction he has gone. An officer saw a large stone, upon which an Indian had drawn the figure of a soldier on horseback, to indicate to others which way the soldiers had gone.

Origin of Evil.—They have a tradition handed down that the Great Spirit said they might eat of all the animals he had made, except the beaver. But some bad Indians went and killed a beaver, and the Great Spirit was angry and said they must all die. But after awhile he became willing that Indians should kill and eat them, so the beaver is hunted for his skin, and his meat is eaten as often as he suffers himself to be caught.

1 (Return)

Labagh.

DESPOILING THE GRAVE OF AN OLD ONONDAGA CHIEF.

On-on-da-ga was the name of an Indian chief, who died about the year 1830, near Elbridge, a town lying north of Auburn, in the State of New York. This Indian belonged to the Onondagas, one of the tribes called the Six Nations of the Iroquois (E-ro-kwa), a confederacy consisting of the Mohawks, Oneidas, Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagas, and Tuscaroras or Chippewas. I was a lad at the time of this chief's death, having my home in Auburn, New York, where my father was the physician and surgeon to the State prison. My father had a cousin, who was also a doctor and surgeon, a man of stalwart frame, raised in Vermont, named Cogswell. He was proud of his skill in surgery, and devoted to the science. He had learned of the death of the Onondaga chief, and conceived the idea of getting the body out of the grave for the purpose of dissecting the old fellow,—that is, of cutting him up and preserving his bones to hang up on the walls of his office; of course, there was only one way of doing it, and that was by stealing the body under cover of night, as the Indians are very superstitious and careful about the graves of their dead. You know they place all the trappings of the dead—his bow and arrows, tomahawk and wampum—in the grave, as they think he will need them to hunt and supply his wants with on his journey to the happy hunting-grounds. They place food and tobacco, with other things, in the grave.

Dr. Cogswell took two men one night, with a wagon, and as the distance was only twelve miles, they performed the journey and got back safely before daylight, depositing the body of the Indian in a barn belonging to a Mr. Hopkins, in the north part of the town. It was soon noised about town what they had done, and there lived a man there who threatened to go and inform the tribe of the despoiling of the chief's grave, unless he was paid thirty dollars to keep silence. The doctor, being a bold, courageous man, refused to comply with a request he had no right to make, because it was an attempt to levy black mail, as it is called.

Sure enough, he kept his word, and told the Onondagas, who were living between Elbridge and Syracuse. They were very much exasperated when they heard what had been done, and threatened vengeance on the town where the dead chief lay.

The tribe was soon called together, and a march was planned to go up to Auburn by the way of Skaneateles Lake,—a beautiful sheet of water lying six miles east of Auburn. They encamped in the pine woods,—a range called the pine ridge,—half-way between the two villages, and sent a few of the tribe into Auburn for the purpose of trading off the baskets they had made for powder and shot; but the real purpose they had in view was to find out just where the body was (deposited in the barn of Mr. Josiah Hopkins), intending to set fire to the barn and burn the town, rescuing the dead chief at the same time.

For several days the town was greatly excited, and every fireside at night was surrounded with anxious faces; the children listening with greedy ears to narratives of Indian cruelties perpetrated during the war with the English about Canada, in 1812; and I remember how it was told of a cruel Indian named Philip, that he would seize little babes from their mothers' arms and dash out their brains against the wall! No wonder we dreamed horrid dreams of the dusky faces every night.

At that time the military did not amount to much. There was a company of citizen soldiers there, called the Auburn Guards, numbering about forty men, with a captain whose name I forget, but who became suddenly seized with the idea of his unfitness to defend the town against the threatened Indian invasion, and did the wisest thing he could, and resigned his commission on a plea of "sudden indisposition. The doctor walked the street as bold as a lion, but acting also with the shrewd cunning of the fox. And now, my young friends, instead of weaving a bloody romance in the style of the Dime Novels," depicting the terrible massacre, which might have happened, with so great a wrong to provoke the hostility of the poor Indians, I am about to tell you